The Reverend Al Sharpton dances with an anonymous woman at the Apollo Theater's tribute to Michael Jackson last night in Harlem. [Pic via Stan Honda/Getty]

Barack Obama's bizarre alliance with NBC continued last week when the White House invited network chief/seasoned clubrat Ben Silverman over for a highly publicized meeting just in time for the launch of Silverman's shitty new show, The Philanthropist.

Celebrated slice-of-lifer and avid Twitterer Susan Orlean lives in Columbia County with four chickens. Or, rather, she did. On Sunday she set the creatures loose for a little constitutional. Now she's complaining about the cremation costs of one dead chicken.

Bernie Madoff's been sentenced to die in prison. Now, all those victimized by him have found peace. Just kidding! They're all in anguish. Seriously, we're worried about them. The victims are dealing with their rage in three distinct ways:

Lisa Falcone is the bubbly, money-flinging wife of billionaire hedge funder Philip Falcone—who owns 20% of the New York Times. Lisa enjoys the simple things, like her $50 million mansion's basement apartment. She's a role model for young billionheiresses!

Steve Jobs is BACK! Oh, he's just stone cold striding into the office, high-fiving people, running marathon meetings, screaming his as... err, wait, actually, did we say "back?" More like backish. The official word:

Bernie Madoff has just been sentenced to 150 years in prison for running the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. It was the maximum sentence the judge could have given him.

Harlem, especially the Apollo, is the media's unofficial spot to get Black America's reaction to Michael Jackson's death. Matt Harvey dropped by last Friday and listened in on a conversation that was full of adoration and, yes, angry conjecture.

The media needs heroes in these dark days. And what is more heroic than fighting off a Sex Thug, hmm?

While you're out this morning at brunch, mumbling semi-coherent thoughts about how amazing the citizens of Iran are, people somewhere will be fighting for change, actually doing something to alter the course of history! Nope, not Iranians. Hondurans! Viva?

The situation is only getting worse for Iranians contesting the June 12 election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Based on the results of a new study, psychologist Randolph Nesse has developed a hypothesis linking depression to the ability to discard unreachable goals, which, apparently, is an American specialty.

[White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs gets dunked during a luau (an Indonesian luau perhaps???) held on the South Lawn yesterday for members of Congress and their families; image via Getty]

In your overwhelmed Friday media column: Iran just arrests everyone, for reporting, Conde Nast's September prayers will not be answered, a new chairman at the FCC, and the Mark Sanford source remains at large.

When Jermaine Jackson made a statement on his brother's death last night, he noted that Michael Jackson's family physician was with him when he collapsed. But who is he? And where's that doctor now? The world is looking for him.

The Way We Live Now: Waiting for that last big score. The government won't let us stop working. The economy won't let us start working. We just go to college and dream of finding a box full of cash.

Good lord: more than half of all deaths of Russians aged 15-54 can be attributed to "excessive alcohol consumption."

Michael Jackson was a beloved worldwide star for the entire 1980s. Even after his reputation darkened, he remained a global obsession. But underlining his death is a sense we'll see no more stars of that scale and endurance.

Updated The King of Pop Michael Jackson has passed away, according to TMZ, after suffering cardiac arrest at his Los Angeles home. Paramedics arrived on the scene but were unable to revive him.

While we toil away in the gloom over here in Jerktown USA, 140,000 music-loving foreigners have descended on England's Glastonbury Music Festival, the biggest music fest in Europe. Hey, they have gloomy weather too! Here's a Getty Images gallery.